


this is what the living do

by ewagan



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Epistolary, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-07
Updated: 2019-11-07
Packaged: 2021-01-24 18:41:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21342898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ewagan/pseuds/ewagan
Summary: It is so strange to think that soon I will be older than you ever were or will be, and it pains me in a way I cannot explain.A series of letters from Ingrid to Glenn, stretching from her days at Garreg Mach to shortly after the war.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Ingrid Brandl Galatea, Glenn Fraldarius/Ingrid Brandl Galatea
Comments: 8
Kudos: 43





	this is what the living do

and if you discover some old piece  
of your own writing, or an old photograph,  
you may not remember that it was you and even if it was once you,  
it’s not you now,  
— Stuart Kestenbaum, _Prayer for the Dead_

* * *

Day 16 of the Pegasus Moon, 1180

Glenn,

The year is turning and spring will be here soon. Already the days are longer, though the mornings are still chilly, if not as cold as Faerghus. I wonder sometimes if you would enjoy Garreg Mach Monastery as much as I do, with the expansive grounds and the greenhouse and fishing moat. There is always something to do here, if only you are willing to do it.

Mother writes to tell me that Aifric is in foal, and I wish I could be home to see her through this time. She has always been fond of you, if only because she knew how much I adored you. Daithi is quite a respectable war pegasus now, used to the loud noises of the battlefield. He is no longer so skittish or highly strung, and will be a boon to someone one day. For now, he is my companion in Garreg Mach, and my professor has been a great help to both of us.

You know I used to dream of being a pegasus knight, and this has given me the opportunity to be that. It is so wonderful to soar above the spires of the cathedral, to spot Felix in the training grounds or Sylvain chatting up someone. It is even better when we are training, mock battles and such. But the reality of battle is different and terrifying, where I must know where and when to strike, if only so someone I love does not die.

And even so, some losses are inevitable.

Glenn, sometimes I wonder if you would have loved me if you could see now, if you knew me now. To you, I am still twelve and catching bugs, my face smudged with dirt and completely unladylike. I cling to the memory of you and the ways it has changed me, wanting still to be someone you would want.

But the thing is, even without noticing, without realising it, I have changed. I have changed so much in this time, even though I still wear my hair in a braid, that I favour trousers over skirts. I have grown up and grown older, and as much as I would like to say I haven't changed, the fact is I did. Your death changed me in ways I cannot begin to explain, from the year I spent crying myself to sleep every night to the way I talk to Felix now and hear you. He has changed too, so much so that sometimes I wonder if the Felix we used to know died with you. We are all changed now, Felix and Sylvain and Dimitri and I.

It is so strange to think that soon I will be older than you ever were or will be, and it pains me in a way I cannot explain. Were it not for tragedy unfolding five years ago, we would be marrying in the coming spring.

I love you still, Glenn. But I do not know now if I love you, or the idea of you I have built in my head. I am so afraid of becoming someone you cannot recognise it I fail to realise that simply through the passing of time, I have already become that. And in that, I also realise that I did not know you very well at all. Not the way I should, nor the way I would were we to marry.

It is a shame. For I wish still, that I could know you in that way, that you would know me in that way as well. I wish for the life we could have had, the joys and sorrows we might have shared. But this is lost to us now, and I have shed enough tears for all the things we lost that day.

I miss you so very much, and all the things we could have had. But they were not ours to have, and perhaps I will be fortunate enough to have them with someone else. Some part of my heart will always belong to you and all these things that were not meant to be, but the world keeps moving on, and I am moving with it.

With my love always,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 12 of the Garland Moon, 1181

Glenn,

I am thinking of you today, and the day Dimitri came home from Duscur. My grief was heavy and beyond me, but I think Dimitri's has trapped him so much that even now, he is so very lost in it. I worry for him, but I do not know how to make any of it lesser.

I feel so much that I have failed him as his friend, because I was so caught up in my grief for you I forgot he has lost and lost more than I. Would you think ill of me for this, for failing to protect him from himself? Felix might have been the crier, but Dimitri has always been the most softhearted, and I fear so much this will be the loss that undoes him. He has always felt others' pains too keenly for someone who was to be king, but it is hard to fault him for being too soft.

There is unrest in the capital, I hear. I am not certain what is going on in court, and we are too busy now to go. Still, Sylvain writes to me and the messages he sends cause me concern, while Felix barely writes at all. I only hope that Dimitri will be alright, though he is too busy to write me now. Funny how some things don’t change, even after all these years. Here I am, still fretting over them.

At least Dedue is with him, much as I am uncertain of him. If there is one thing I can trust, it is that Dedue will protect Dimitri with everything, in a way I cannot.

Have I ever written about Dedue to you? He is a mountain of a man, or an immovable object, as you might say. Much like your father was with King Lambert. There is no questioning his loyalty to Dimitri, only that he is from Duscur. I still cannot bring myself to think well of Duscur and the people from there, not with all the losses that have occurred. Perhaps you think me petty and shallow for it, but the incident has hurt both myself and the people I love deeply. Forgiveness is hard to come by, much as Dedue has been good and kind to me, if only for Dimitri's sake. I know that I have been unkind to him, but it is difficult to be kind when I look at him and only see my losses.

Perhaps one day I will learn, and the sight of him will stop being a source of pain for me.

I do not know really what it is I wish to tell you with this letter. Only that I am worried for the days to come, and the paths we must all take. Things are changing, and I fear we are starting down a dangerous path. I only hope that the path we walk will not be one we cannot return from.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 7 of the Blue Sea Moon, 1181

Glenn,

Dimitri is lost to us now, or so they say. Cornelia has issued a decree for Dimitri’s execution, accusing him of killing Grand Duke Rufus. The idea of it is preposterous, because the entire castle and half the kingdom knows that Dimitri adored his uncle, and Rufus adored him similarly. Perhaps they have not been as close in recent years, but the very idea that Dimitri might ever do such a thing is unthinkable.

Nonetheless, Dimitri is missing, and neither Felix nor Sylvain have heard or found anything. I am fearful of what trouble this news may bring, and what impact it may have on the war.

I had hoped so dearly that I would not mourn any of you again so soon, but my heart aches so terribly at the news. I hope it is not true, that it is merely hearsay and rumour, that Dimitri is still alive somewhere. I want to hope, because it would break my heart otherwise.

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 27 of the Lone Moon, 1181.

Glenn,

The capital is fallen. The Holy Kingdom of Faerghus is no more.

The lines are drawn now. The remains of the kingdom, and what is now the Faerghus Dukedom. Though skirmishes have been breaking out for the last few months, I think only the northern and eastern lords will hold fast. It is only House Gautier and House Fraldarius who have openly declared contempt for the notion of the Dukedom. My father is in support, of course. But he is not quite so ready to declare his allegiances for fear of how it would affect us.

Would you know better what to do in this time, Glenn? I do not. My hands tremble when I reach for my lance, but it is a comfort to know I can fight for myself and what I believe in.

I must take a stand for this, for the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus. I cannot bear the thought of people being trampled on in a bloody war, and it is only right that I do so, as a knight and as a person.

A knight would go forth and fight, a knight would stand up for their lord. But I am still the daughter of House Galatea first and foremost, even though I have long dreamed of becoming a knight. I would fight for Dimitri in a heartbeat, pledge my service to his cause, and lay my life down for his cause. But Dimitri is not here, and I am uncertain of which path I must take. Were I to leave my house and my responsibilities behind to become a knight in service of the kingdom, how would my family fare?

I wonder if you ever thought of these things. But then, you had Felix, so perhaps you worried less. Even so, my heart tugs me one way and then another. Duty binds me to House Galatea, as do my father's hopes. I always feel that I must do my best too for House Galatea, if only for my family's sake.

But in my more selfish moments, I wonder why is it Aidan or Eithne would not be enough to carry House Galatea forward. Does the Crest truly matter so much? We are not a warrior family like House Fraldarius or House Gautier, though we are not lacking in skilled fighters. Surely it does not matter if I do not inherit or lead House Galatea. My brother and sister are gifted in their own ways beyond having a Crest, and would make far better leaders of House Galatea as their hearts are not elsewhere, the way mine is.

But more troubles us than the questions of inheritance or allegiances. The empire is coming to subdue us, and I cannot abide this. Even if Father is not willing to openly declare his allegiances, I know where mine lie. That much I am certain of, amidst all of these uncertainties.

I will see Felix and Sylvain soon, and it may well be the last we see of each other for a while. But I will hope, if only because I cannot afford to despair.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 2 of the Guardian Moon, 1182

Glenn,

We are a kingdom at war now within itself. It is terrifying and heartbreaking to think of this, to know I may yet have to face my former classmates on the battlefield in defense of what I hold dear.

How do you find conviction in this? How do you know that what you stand for is the right thing, certain and sure enough you will take someone else's life for it, or give up your own? I don't know the answers to these questions, but they are pressing down on me with each day that passes, as the Empire continues its conquest.

I am fortunate that I do not have to ride out yet, but Sylvain's letters have tapered off of late. With the Sreng borders and the skirmishes with Fhirdiad, I imagine he has little time to write. I worry for him, as I do Felix. I have not heard from Felix in two moons now, and I hope he has not tried to do something foolish. Perhaps that hope in itself is foolish, but Felix has always been good at taking care of himself. Even more so now, since the years you have passed. Sometimes he reminds me so much of you it pains me. It reminds me of what you could have been, or have been. It makes me wonder what things could be like now, were it not for all that has passed.

These days are troubling, and I am finding myself caught up again between the past and the future that should have been, the one where we are all happy, where there is no war. It is easier to think of that than to wonder about Felix or Sylvain or Dimitri, or the other friends I made in Garreg Mach.

I look back at our younger selves and I wish so much that things had not changed so. Sometimes I walk out by our tree and wondered if I looked up, would you be hidden amongst the branches with a book, avoiding your father and mine? I wonder if Felix would be softer, kinder, if you had been around. I wonder if we would all still be as close as we had been as children, if the world had not made us so hard and sharp to protect ourselves.

Perhaps in a different life, we stay together. If not the next, then the one after. Surely there must be a future in which we are happy, where we don't carry the world on our shoulders. One without a war, without all these sorrows weighing us down.

Maybe one day I will be able to look back on these days and find value in them, but now I only see our sorrows stacked up, one upon another. We have survived thus far, but I am afraid for the days to come, and if I will learn the limits of sorrow my heart can bear.

I can almost imagine you telling me again that I am stronger than I know, that I will only get stronger yet. But even the mightiest of oaks will bend and break, if the storm is fierce enough.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 30 of the Great Tree Moon, 1183.

My Glenn,

I cut my hair.

It's so strange not to feel the weight of it, and I keep reaching out to touch the shorter ends of it. Father was scandalised when he found out, but Eithne tells me it suits me. Even Aidan has said it looks good on me, and we all know that a compliment from Aidan is nigh unheard of. I wonder what you would make of it, if it would make you smile to see me like this.

After so many years I have tried to remain unchanged, I find that I am changing once more. It is not just the loss of my hair. My hands now are rough with calluses from training and work, and are not at all a lady's hands. These are hands that have handled foaling mares and wielded homemade lances, cooked meals and scrubbed floors and dishes and carried harvests home. They do not know how to play instruments or perform fine needlework, nor to rest or dance or whatever it is that the other ladies do.

I am making my own future with these hands, strange as the thought may be.

I hope that I can be someone you will be proud of, someone you would have been proud to call your wife. Or only as your friend, as someone who looked up to you with all my heart. I will never know how things might have changed or been between you and I, and perhaps it is more than a little foolish to imagine I would have fought alongside you as a knight, but a part of me is still a little girl dreaming of this.

But enough dreaming, enough wishing and sighing for a future that was not meant to be. The past and future are not things I can change now, however easy it is to be caught up in them. So I will work on the present, that I may have the future I wish for. And if I change even more, I can only pray that these are good changes that will lead to a better future.

As ever, my love.

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 20 of the Ethereal Moon, 1185

Glenn,

It is Dimitri's birthday today. I lit a candle for him in the chapel, if only so I could remember. Perhaps it is a waste of a good candle, especially when war is making us lean and we can ill-afford luxuries or waste, but more than ever now, we need to hope.

I leave for Garreg Mach tomorrow, with Sylvain and Felix. I do not know what we will find there, but perhaps we will find a miracle. We are in need of one so badly now in these days. If nothing, I hope I will find my friends once more, find heart to keep going, to keep fighting for what I believe in. We made a promise, all of us five years ago. I hope that the rest remember.

I have never told you much about our professor, Glenn. But our professor was an amazing person. Perhaps not that much older than us, but extraordinary nonetheless. It was just how our professor was, in a quiet, ineffable way. I so very much hope that this reunion at Garreg Mach we will meet again. Perhaps even Dimitri might be there, if it is not so foolish to hope for such a thing.

Rodrigue has heard rumours, and while Felix dismisses them out of hand, I want to hope. They may be bloody, vicious rumours, but they could well be true. Just knowing Dimitri is alive will do much to bolster our spirits and morale, whatever circumstances it is we find him in. If only so we have someone to rally behind, a reason for us to keep fighting.

If the rumours are true, however, I am fearful of what we will find.

Even so, I will keep praying for a miracle, though I do not know if the goddess hears our prayers, or if she will answer them. It is the only thing that will turn the tide of this war, instead of the deadlock we have been in. As much as we are holding out now, it is only a matter of time before something gives somewhere. I fear what is to come, though I am more sure now of what needs to be done.

May the winds bless us on our journeys and the goddess watch over us in these dark times.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 2 of the Harpstring Moon, 1186

My Glenn,

I write to you from Gronder Field. We will soon be on our way back to Fhirdiad to reclaim the capital. I am glad Dimitri has come to his senses, even if the cost was high. Our teacher's patience and kindness has worn on him, much as I had hoped it would. Dimitri is in terrible need of forgiveness and kindness, most especially from himself. I'm afraid that I too, have been guilty of being too unkind and unforgiving of him.

Felix refused to perform the rites for Rodrigue. Dimitri did them instead, but we are at war and things were hurried at best. I suppose we will do all this once more when we are at peace, when we have more time to mourn our losses and honour our dead. If Felix will not build the cairn for Rodrigue, then I will. Even so, I hope that he passes on safely, that he finds peace in the knowledge that Dimitri is finding his way once more.

It has only become more clear to me now how much we have lost in this war, and over the years. I talk about myself, but I don’t talk of Felix, of Dimitri. But as I see it, their grief has crippled them in different ways. Dimitri cannot move forward for it, and Felix is afraid to stop moving for fear of it catching up with him.

Perhaps I have no room to speak, when my own grief consumed me for years, and eats away at me still this day. I suppose I too have been paralysed by my grief, but I'd like to believe I am no longer being held back by it, and have turned it into a strength of some sorts.

But as I look at us now, I wish we were all not so burdened, and that we had been better and kinder to each other in our own grief. It is only in hindsight I can see it, and it feels like a failing to only realise this after another loss.

But we march onwards, Glenn. Despite our losses, despite our grief. We move forwards, and we will reclaim Fhirdiad, then Arianrhod, then we will take Enbarr and with it, end this bloody war that has gone on too long. I cannot say I understand what it is that drives this war, but I know it threatens everything I hold dear. Perhaps that is reason enough for me to take up my lance and fight.

I hope when I next have time to write, it will be because the war is over. I wish to be home once more, to see our tree in bloom before it fades.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 16 of the Verdant Rain Moon, 1186

Glenn,

We leave for Enbarr on the morrow. The end is in sight now, and it is so strange to this that this war we have been fighting so desperately for so long may well be over in a matter of days.

Dimitri doesn't speak of his ghosts anymore, but I know they must haunt him still. He has always been too tenderhearted in this way, too willing to assign himself blame for things he cannot do anything about. I fear we underestimated how difficult it has been for him, and failed to give him the support he needed.

I never used to understand this, but I think I do now. Many people have told me that dying is not something virtuous or noble, even Dimitri himself has said it. I refused to think about it as such, even when he tried to tell me about what he had seen, the way you had died. I have failed to consider this in my stubborn determination to see you only as an ideal.

But as this war carries on and I see more and more of death, of what happens to families after, perhaps I understand better now. There is no glory or honour in the dying, even for a cause of in something you believe in. And more than ever, I am realising living is so much harder than dying.

I do not want to be another ghost to haunt him. As we march forwards to Enbarr, he has more conviction, more surety of the path he must take. I would gladly follow him, and take up arms for his cause. I used to think that I would be happy to die for him as well, but now I think that Dimitri does not need me to die for him.

I would like to live, Glenn. I want to see Dimitri ascend the throne. I want to live to see the future that Dimitri will bring to Fódlan. I want to live and laugh and tell stories of Dimitri to his children, to my own, to Sylvain's, and Felix's. I want to go home and kiss my mother on the cheek and tell my father that I will become a knight in service of the kingdom. I want to fly with Daithi across Gronder Field and visit Derdriu again, this time not as a soldier but as someone come to visit, or perhaps an emissary if Dimitri sees fit to appoint me as such.

I have seen so much and lived so much and I want to live more, see more, be more. I want to see all of Fódlan that I can, then come home and say this is where my heart belongs, however much I love all these other parts of Fódlan. I want to climb our tree and watch it bloom around me again, and remember you and your smile and your promise to look after me.

At the end of it, I want to have lived a life without regret, without becoming someone's ghost. I do not want to be another regret in Dimitri's heart, another burden for him to carry. I want to see him laugh and smile again, to put down all these burdens he has been carrying for the last nine years. I want to be kinder to him, to be the kind of friend he needs so desperately, the way I should have been from the start.

I have failed him so badly, but I will not fail him in this. I will fight for him, for his cause and in his name, but I will not die for him. He has mourned enough for a lifetime and he has more sorrow to come, but if it is within my power not to add to his sorrows, then I will do so.

I will not see you anytime soon, but you are ever in my thoughts and in my heart.

Yours,

Ingrid.

* * *

Day 5 of the Red Wolf Moon, 1186

Glenn,

The bonfire was so bright tonight, you would have loved it. There was ale and wine everywhere, and Felix was laughing for the first time I can remember in a long time. A real laugh, one of those deep belly laughs you had to coax out of him with tickling, not one of his half-hearted scoffs of amusement.

Dimitri is also happier, a weight off his shoulders now. Kingship looks good on him, and I am glad we have made it to this day. However bitter the fights, however long and painful this road has been and will be, it was worth it. I believe this with all my heart.

Glenn, tonight we were holding a wake for all those we lost. Some part of me is selfishly glad that I still have Felix and Dimitri and Sylvain, that I can reach out and grasp their hands in mine, that I can say thank you for being here, for still being here. As much as the losses sadden me, I cannot help but be thankful that they are not my losses, that it is not more grief I have to learn to bear.

As we celebrate and mourn all these lives lost and unlived, I think of you, as I oft do in times like this. I wonder what you would have done in my place, if you were here. But you aren't, and much as I loved you then and love your memory now, you will not come back. You have gone, and still I am holding onto you.

You are ten years gone, my Glenn. I have lost you for almost as long as I have known you now, and the years will only keep passing. I do not know if it is a tragedy to have a life that has been filled with so much sorrow in so short a time, or a blessing that I can learn and grow with it, as I have done in the years since your leaving.

We raised a glass to those who have gone tonight—those lost in this war, those lost before. We are not the same as we were when we started down this path, even though we are all still here. We have lost so much to get here, but all the things we have gained in their stead—I cannot say it was not worth it, that the cost was too high. Only that I wish we did not have to lose so much on our way here.

This war has changed me, and I am more certain of myself in some ways, but also more lost in others. Nonetheless, I find myself looking to the future, and to others. I am looking forward instead of backwards for the first time in a long time, and what I can see heartens me.

I am thinking of those nights your father and you left our estate for your own, how I would watch you ride off, my hands wrapped around the parting glass I offered you. I am thinking of the words my father used to say, the song I used to sing as a child, that we sang again tonight when we were deep in our cups, mixing laughter and tears alike. There is a time to give thanks and to say goodbye, as we did tonight.

So, thank you, Glenn. For being my knight, my ideal, the example I held up and tried to emulate. Thank you for your kindness to a young girl who never quite learned how to love you, for all the things you gave to us in ways we are still discovering. Thank you for all the strength you have given me to come this far, and to keep going in a path that I believe in. Thank you for keeping your promise to look out for me, though perhaps not in the way you intended.

This is my parting glass, long overdue. Goodnight, my Glenn. Joy be with you, wherever you go.

Your Ingrid.

**Author's Note:**

> kudos and comments always appreciated.


End file.
